GRAPHICSSettingThere are over 15 different maps which are all based around urban areas. The detail put on them is very good despite everything being small and compact for the UMD. The floors on the areas sometimes appear to flicker when keeping the character in the same spot and fine lines of emptiness may appear on the map when huddled close to a corner. These things however do not effect gameplay in any way.

The CharactersCharacters have obviously had a lot of time spent on them to make them seem as graphically good as they can get. Each character, down to the minor detail is pretty realistic. They do retain that obvious polygon origin to their model, but this is seemingly invisible. There are over 20, maybe 30 different characters which adds tons of variety to the game. There are also different version of the same character which expands even more variety of characters. For example, a Lynx soldier can be either long-sleeved or sleeves rolled-up. Another soldier, the Ex-Fox Unit can have three different faces. Every boss you face in the game is also playable. As a matter of fact every character that you see with an in-game model is playable (excluding Roy Campbell). That's every character. These characters are all unique in someway. Which previous games, skins for characters only covered half the actual character and where then mirror so the character had a seemingly full-body skin. But with Portable Ops, you'll find no line of symmetry down either side of your character.

MiscIcons are oddly envious. Almost every Portable Ops player yearns to have access to every Portable Ops icon on their computer. It's not surprising either, as Portable Ops has many visually enchanting diagrams of guns, ammunition and equipment and even characters. Portable Ops menu backgrounds make you almost wish that you had them on your PSP XMB background and not only on the game.

SOUNDSSoundtrackAnother superb masterpiece by Norihiko Hobino and Akihiro Honda and theme song by Natasha Farrow. "Calling to the Night" is emotionally moving and will see as one of the greatest MGS Theme Songs of all time. The music can literally give you goosebumps. Battlefield music is perfectly orchestrated into the gameplay and perfect with each situation. Quietly sneaking through enemy territory has slow, clam yet mysterious music. A bullet shoots past your ear and commences alert mode and the music builds up to tense drumming beats which transforms a simple game into a cinematic masterpiece. Even calling it a masterpiece isn't enough to fully describe how intensely invigoration the sounds are.

Sound EffectsSound-effects are A-grade. Guns sound-effects are realistic in every way and don't sound like they were recorded on some windy hill. Bullets can be heard impacting on different terrains. Each terrain has a different thud sound. Players grunt when feeling the force of a bullet to their bodies. This however can get quite repetitive, but yet it never does.

GAMEPLAYPlaythroughNew features such as recruiting a personal army of 100 men strong is what makes this game to die for. The ability to recruit any soldier on the battlefield you see fit is a heavenly new addition to the Metal Gear series. As stated before, every game boss and soldier is playable at some stage.

You can literally build your own private army. Of course you need recruits. But don't expect them to enlist in your fine army from a front-desk counter. You have to knock out an enemy soldier on the battlefield and drag them back to your truck to 'capture' them. After that, your soldier undergoes intense interrogation and 'convincing' until after a few days they finally decide to join your unit.

Every Soldier has individual stats which define them as a good soldier and a bad one. Each stat and how good the soldier is with that stat is represent with either an A, B, C or S. C being the worst, B being average, A being good and S being Perfect (Special). Soldier have stats for different types of weapons and Technical & Medical Skill. These stats determine how well they deal with what those stats are affiliated with. For example, if say one solider has a stat as low as a C in Handguns, whenever they use a Handgun their accuracy will be poor and they will simply not have enough skill to use it properly. If they however have an S in Handguns, their aim would be almost perfectly still and their reload times would be much faster and essential to surviving those last few seconds in an intense battle.

There are different types of 'units' within you 100 man army. They are Medical, Technical, Spy and Sneaking. Different class soldiers are suited for different units. Some recruits may have a talent for mechanical thing such as being handy with a wrench, so they are suited for Technical Unit. Others may be a Chemist or a Doctor, so the Medical Unit is recommended for them. Putting suited soldiers in their suited units add helpful advantages to your army. More medical units means soldiers heal at faster rates while not on the battlefield. Spy units deployed in areas gather intel on any occurances, weapons or equipment within the designated area and provide detailed maps of that area.

The game's equipment slots only allow 4 types of items on any player at one time. This means that in order to change around stuff, you have to constantly edit your character's equipment for each and every level. This is sometimes annoying. Also, after you've spent precious moments training your soldier to almost ultimate perfection and then suddenly kill them and forever lose them in a suicide mission will make you cringe your teeth in anger, but it is an understandable approach made by Konami.

Lastly, in the battle. When in the battlefield, depending on what type of soldier you have may determine how well you 'blend in' with the enemy. It is possible to deploy a soldier with the same clothing as the patrolling soldiers in an area. This means that your soldier will 'blend in' with other soldiers and be seen as another on to the team, passing of as a comrade and not an enemy. This eases up the process of infiltrating and/or capturing. However, maybe due to a bug in the game, this disguise doesn't always work. Sometimes, out of the ordinary your player may be interpreted as an enemy and the alert status raised, even if that person wasn't doing anything unusual at the time. This usually catches players out in surprise who weren't expecting something like that to happen at the last minute, and becomes very annoying.

What Konami got right:Short missions which are perfect for the hand-held device. Tons of customisation for soldiers and replayability. Online mode is exciting and adds even more replayability. Superb soundtrack and sound-effects.

What Konami needs to fix:Story needs to be much longer and mission longer as well. Killed by loss of Stamina should be removed, but not the Stamina gauge itself. Soldier's in disguise of enemy should not be so easily discovered, even if they aren't doing anything out of the ordinary (One of the glitches).

CONCLUSIONOverall, this is one of the BEST PSP games to date. If your an action/adventure game lover, this game will sneak it's way into your PSP collection even if your expecting it to or not.